Savage World •••Daryl Dixon•••

Self-Confident

Asher lay prone on the couch for hours, blood oozing from almost every inch of her body like endless rivers. She coughed and choked on her own blood as she forced her aching head to turn to the side so her throat would drain out the blood it was hoarding. At some point she needed to close and disinfect these wounds or she'll die, but her body would scream in refusal every time she attempted to even lift her head more than an inch. It wasn't long before she could feel her body begin to rage with a fever.

"Asher?" Forcing her eyes to open, she was met with the hazed frame of Daryl across the room.

"Dixie, you found me." The man smirked and stepped closer to kneel a few inches away from her.

"Oh, sweetheart, did you doubt me?" She slowly blinked and opened them up to an empty room. A feverish delusion. Tears mixed with her blood and she let the tears slide over her nose to turn the deep crimson a lighter shade before slipping off to soak into the well ruined couch.

"Please don't leave me behind." Asher cried until she ran out of tears and lay stiffly sniffling on the couch.

"Is this what we really pulled you outta that basement fer?" She pushed her eyelids open again to be met with the disappointed face of Merle.

"What do you care? You left us, remember?" Merle chuckled and lifted his bloody stump hand with a shrug.

"I had ta survive, sweetheart. You woulda done the same if this were yer lot. But you didn't answer me, Asher. Is this what we brought you with us fer? Just to kick the bucket in some shithole house because some dick twitches knocked ya around a little?" Asher swallowed a lump of saliva and blood before answering back.

"No. You didn't." Merle leaned against the threshold of the opening to the hallway leading to unknown parts of the house.

"Then why are ya over there cryin'? Did they hurt your feelins?" Asher glared at the smirking man, his arm dripping blood that she watched bloom into small roses on contact with the carpet.

"Eat shit, Merle. You ain't even real. And Dixie could be dead for all I know. So what's the point?" Merle appeared at her side, intact hand digging deep into one of her many cuts from the assault and the road. Despite knowing he wasn't real, her body reacted with real pain and she growled through clenched teeth.

"The point, sweetheart, is that you've come too far to sit on yer ass an' die now. So get yer ass up and start fixin' what's broken!" He yanked out his hand and used it to wrap around her bony waist and yank her from the couch. She smacked to the floor with a growling whimper.

"Merle you're such an asshole." His voice sounded right beside her ear.

"And you're stronger than this. Yer a Dixon fer fuck sake!" Hands on her shoulders yanked her from the floor and pushed her stumbling for the bathroom. Throwing open the door, she fumbled around the room looking for a first aid kit or any medicines to help her break her fever.

"What's more important, baby girl? Stopping the bleeding or breaking the fever?" She looked up in the mirror and saw Daryl leaning back against the door, his usual smirk lifting his lips as he toyed with the clasp of his hunting knife sheath. She coughed up crimson into the pastel yellow sink that she assumed was once a pearly white veneer.

"Bleeding. The fever won't kill me, but blood loss will." She glanced up at Daryl for affirmation, the man nodding slowly as his smirk grew wider.

"Damn smart." Merle poked his head into the room with a manic smile.

"But what'll ya be doin about that bleedin yer doin on the inside?" Asher took in a ragged breath to see if she could gauge the damage done. No punctured lungs, no pain from a burst appendix, nothing but the blood she was bringing up from her stomach.

"It's fine. It's just a small tear in the stomach lining. It's happened before with Joshua. I had to lay still for a week but I was okay afterwards. Internal bleeding isn't an issue unless the tear gets bigger. So I need to focus on external bleeding." She gave up on a first aid kit in the bathroom and moved to find some regular bandages. Most of the cuts were shallow and had already stopped bleeding, and so far only the gash across her forehead looked to need stitches. Finding the box of bandages, she covered every cut she could find before taking the box back to the bathroom so she could properly place her butterfly stitches. She couldn't find the needles or thread to attempt typical ones so these will have to do.

"Yer doin real good sweetheart, but the fight ain't over." Merle snapped from his place in the bathtub, hands reaching up to lightly swing on the curtain pole. Definitely a hallucination.

"What's next? The fever?" Both Dixon men nodded and she tugged on the mirror to open it up hoping to find any medicine. She was instead met with bare and dusty cabinets.

"It ain't gonna be that easy, Asher." The girl gripped tightly to the sink, arms shaking to hold her up as she growled angrily.

"Then what?! What do you want from me?! I can't do what you guys can!"

"Why not?" Her gaze moved from Merle in the bathtub to Daryl in the mirror. He looked tired this time. Tired and sad.

"Look at you two! Badass from the jump, built and tailor made for this world. You guys are so strong and I'm... well this. I cry and get my ass kicked and I can't even fix myself up right. I'm not like you guys, I can't..." Hands skimmed up over her protruding spine gently, bringing her gaze back up to the mirror to see a softly smiling Daryl Dixon.

"You can, Asher Dixon. You can do this, sweetheart."

"How are you so confident in me?" The brothers looked to one another before they both looked at her through the cracked and filmy mirror.

"We're just an extension of you after all, this is all you."